I Am Cūḍālā

And she showed him her own body, as if it had come out of a casket, and he saw his beloved. Who are you, lotus-eyed one? he said. Where have you come from? You seem to be some part of my wife.

So it is, my lord, she said. I am Cūḍālā. Today in my own body I have won you. Only to awaken you did I make these bodies, Kumbha's and the others. From the time you left your kingdom in your delusion and came to the forest for austerity, I have been intent on your awakening. It was I, in Kumbha's body, who awakened you. It was māyā; none of it was real. See it all in meditation.

In a single moment of meditation he saw everything, from his leaving the kingdom to this sight of Cūḍālā, and he embraced her for a long time, weeping and trembling. Not even the serpent king Vāsuki, with all his tongues, could tell that joy. How great was the suffering you bore for your husband's sake, he said. Arundhatī, the wife of the sage Vasiṣṭha, and the goddesses Śacī, Gaurī, Gāyatrī, Śrī and Sarasvatī all seem frail beside your goodness. A good wife of good family carries her fallen husband across as neither scripture nor teacher nor mantra can. How can I repay you? You are my teacher; homage to you. By your grace I have crossed the ocean of becoming.

When you were lost in dry rites, my lord, she said, I grieved for you again and again. Now what I sought, your awakening, has come about.